When does the 14-day withdrawal period begin?

It is the most commonplace mistake, and one of the most costly: counting the withdrawal period from the order date. EU consumer law does not say that. Depending on what you sell and how you deliver it, the starting point changes. Getting it wrong means refusing a withdrawal that is still valid, and thereby exposing yourself. Here is the exact rule, set out by the Consumer Rights Directive (2011/83/EU, art. 9), harmonised across the 27 EU member states.

For goods: receipt, not the order

For the sale of goods, the 14-day period runs from the day after the day on which the consumer, or a third party they have designated, takes physical possession of the goods. In other words: delivery, not the purchase.

A customer who orders on the 1st and receives on the 5th has until the 19th to withdraw, not until the 15th. Indeed, as long as the goods have not been delivered, the customer can already withdraw: the period has an end, not a blocking start.

The special delivery cases

Directive 2011/83/EU (art. 9) provides for several situations that do not fall under the simple rule:

• Order of several goods delivered separately: the period runs from receipt of the last item. A customer who orders three items shipped on different dates sees their period start on the arrival of the last one.
• Goods delivered in several lots or pieces: same logic, the starting point is receipt of the last lot or the last piece. Useful for flat-pack furniture or split orders.
• Regular delivery of goods over a defined period (for example a monthly product box): the period runs from receipt of the first item, not from each delivery.

For a service or digital content

The logic changes when there are no physical goods to receive:

• Provision of services: the period runs from the day of the conclusion of the contract. There is no delivery, so it is the signature or the validation of the order that is decisive.
• Digital content not supplied on a tangible medium (download, online access): likewise from the conclusion of the contract. Note that immediate performance with express agreement and waiver may cause the right of withdrawal to be lost, a point distinct from the calculation of the period.

How the 14 days are counted

Once the starting point is fixed, the calculation follows precise rules that are often overlooked:

• The day of receipt of the goods or of the conclusion of the contract is not counted. The period starts the next day.
• These are calendar days, weekends and public holidays included, not working days.
• If the 14th day falls on a Saturday, a Sunday or a public holiday, the period is extended until the next working day.

In concrete terms, a customer who receives their parcel on a Friday has a period that starts on the Saturday and extends, where applicable, until the Monday after the 14th day if it falls on a weekend.

The trap that lengthens everything: missing information

Everything above assumes that you have properly informed the consumer of their right of withdrawal and its terms. If not, the starting point saves nothing: the period is extended, by up to a further 12 months (Directive 2011/83/EU, art. 10). That is the other reason to take care not only with the mechanism, but also with the pre-contractual information and the T&Cs. The mechanism is set out in detail in our file on the 12-month period.

Why it matters in practice

The starting point determines whether a request is admissible or not. On the day a customer withdraws, the first question is: are we within the 14 days? To answer it without dispute, two things are needed: knowing the right start date, and having a reliable record of the date of the request.

This is where proof comes in. A timestamped, archived acknowledgement makes it possible to establish, beyond dispute, that a withdrawal was received on a given date, and therefore to place it in relation to the period. Without that record, the calculation becomes a matter of one person's word against another's. See our file on the evidential value of proof of withdrawal.

Once the request has been received within the deadline, it is then the turn of the 14-day period to refund to run. If in doubt about your situation, check in two minutes whether you are concerned.